


In Sickness and in Health

by crazygirlne



Series: Vows [4]
Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Taking Care of Sick Partner
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-19
Updated: 2016-09-19
Packaged: 2018-08-16 02:40:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,225
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8083438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crazygirlne/pseuds/crazygirlne
Summary: Sara falls sick on a mission. Leonard doesn't take it well, but he still takes care of her.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Unlike most of them, you probably don't need to read the rest of the series before this one. It'd make it better, though. Also, parts of this got angstier than I expected, but Len seriously wasn't happy. I tried to balance it out with a fluffy ending.

The fever hits during a firefight, and it hits hard. Sara feels herself flush and go cold, and only her training lets her overcome the dizziness for long enough for the team to get to safety. She and Leonard are outside the ship, and she forces herself to focus on him. Part of her wants to giggle because he won’t stay in focus (why would he choose to be all blurry like that?) but the rest of her…

“I don’t feel so good.”

Someone hits the light switch, and then there’s nothing but cool, merciful black.

***

“Sara?” Leonard’s been watching her since the shootout. She’s been off, not answering right, and now her cheeks are red and the rest of her face much too pale.

“I don’t feel so good,” she murmurs, then her eyes close, and he barely has time to catch her before she hits the ground. He picks her up (trying his best to ignore how hot she is; she’s burning) and storms up the Waverider’s ramp.

“Gideon,” he calls, ignoring the teammates behind him, “I’m taking Sara to the med bay. Tell me what’s wrong.”

“It appears Miss Lance contracted a virus at our last stop,” the ship responds in her infuriatingly calm voice. “The virus will have to run its course, but I’ll be able to administer something to reduce her fever drastically once you get her to the med bay.”

“Done,” he says, turning the corner into the med bay and setting Sara carefully down in the reclined exam chair.

Stein enters the room then. “Gideon, do the rest of us need to worry about catching the virus?”

“No,” the ship replies. “The incubation period on this virus is long enough that I should be able to read signs on anyone who was going to catch it.”

“Then why didn’t you catch it on Sara?” Leonard growls.

“I regret that I wasn’t actively checking for the virus. You should all have basic immunity to most diseases you encounter on our travels. Miss Lance has never been in poor health before.”

_ Poor health _ . Her eyes are still closed, and she looks so much smaller than usual, so fragile. He spins at the gentle touch on his arm, and he looks into the understanding eyes of the professor. 

“Let us help her, Leonard. We need room.”

Jaw tight, Leonard takes a few steps back, and he watches at the more scientifically or medically inclined of the crew step in to do what needs to be done, catching only glimpses of the unmoving Sara. 

“She’ll be fine, Boss.” Mick’s voice at his side is quiet. “Ship’s not worried, and it’d know if she wasn’t gonna be okay.”

“I know that.” It’s almost a hiss, and he takes a breath. He really does know she’ll be okay, but the part of him that refuses to relax is anything but logical, and for the first time, he really, truly understands why she was keeping him at arm’s length after the mess at the Oculus. 

Mick isn’t scared off by his attitude, standing by him silently until Sara’s given the all-clear. Honestly, it goes a long way toward soothing any hard feelings Leonard still had from last month’s surprise family meeting. As Leonard carries Sara to the room he shares with her, Mick walks behind them. Leonard puts Sara in their bed, pausing just once when she mumbles incoherently in her sleep. Mick’s still there when he glances over his shoulder.

“Let Gideon know if you need me to do anything,” the man says, his eyes moving to Sara with genuine concern. For all his typical posturing and his near-silence now, Mick really does give a shit about both of them, and Leonard knows it.

“Thank you, Mick,” he says before turning back to Sara. He hears their door shut as he gets her under the covers. She’s much cooler now, but she’s still shivering. He shakes his head, clearing his thoughts. It’s easier now that it’s just the two of them, now that she’s in their bed instead of in the med bay. While he might not be great with the type of medical care she was receiving earlier, he knows how to handle this part.

It may have been a few years, but he still remembers how he took care of Lisa when she was sick, while she was young enough to let him. 

***

She’s under warm covers, a cool, damp cloth on her forehead. She’s achy everywhere, but the pain isn’t severe, just annoying. 

“Sara?” His voice is much quieter than usual, which she figures is probably a good thing, because her head is pounding.

“Len?” She opens her eyes, then immediately closes them again, fighting off the wave of nausea. “What happened?”

“You caught a virus. Gideon says it’s a little like the flu, but with fewer symptoms. It hit you pretty hard. You’re in our bed. You’ve been asleep for almost a day.”

“What?” Her eyes fly open again, and this time she’s able to keep them there, the nausea fading after only a moment. Leonard is leaning against the bed, his face about a foot from hers.

He looks almost as bad as she feels.

Mind sluggish, she sorts through things to say.

_ Are you okay? _ Obviously he’s not, but she can see his guard up. He’s not going to tell her what’s wrong, not yet.

_ You stayed with me? _ Of course he did. She’d do the same, and she isn’t really surprised.

Her stomach decides what to say before she does, growling loudly and prompting an almost-smile from Leonard. 

“Here,” he says, handing her the mug she favors when she’s in the mood for soup. It keeps it just the right temperature, not scalding and not cold.

She takes a careful sip, then another when her stomach clamors for more rather than rejecting it. 

“It’s good,” she says after a couple more sips.

“Mick made it.” His voice is gruff, and Sara is full already, so she sets down the mug and reaches for his hand. He lets her take it

“Tell him I said thanks,” she says, getting comfortable again and closing her eyes with a yawn. She quickly slips back into sleep, Leonard’s hand cool and comforting in hers.

***

This is the easy part, he knows. Gideon has informed him that Sara will need to be in bed as much as possible (and without any of the fun sorts of distractions that the prim and proper ship refused to spell out) for a solid week. While she’s still this tired and weak, it won’t be too hard. Sara’s going to start feeling better soon, though, and then he suspects she’s not going to be a very patient patient.

The rest of the crew isn’t particularly patient, either.

Leonard is still holding her hand when Jax knocks lightly on the door.

“What do you want?”

“How’s she doing?” Like the rest of the crew, the kid seems to take no offence to Leonard’s snapping.

He sighs. “Better. She woke up enough to eat some. Fever’s almost gone.”

“Alright. That’s good.”

“You think?” Leonard rests his forehead against Sara’s fingers, eyes closed, before carefully disengaging his hand and standing from the chair he’d dragged next to the bed. “Sorry, kid. Thanks for checking on her.”

“No problem.” He hesitates. “What about you? You doing okay?”

He shouldn’t glare at the kid, he knows. He goes for a withering stare, instead. “I know you’re just trying to be helpful, but if I need anything, I’ll let someone know.”

Jax hasn’t been gone long when the rest of the crew starts dropping by, one at a time. By the time Rip shows up, Leonard’s patience is gone.

“Would you  _ please _ ask everybody to stop coming here?”

“I’ll do that,” Rip answers easily, looking past Leonard to where Sara’s resting. When he looks back at Leonard, there’s understanding there, the same as he’d seen in the professor, almost more than he can handle. “You need to sleep, too.” He holds up a hand and continues when Leonard tries to protest. “She’s well enough that you can sleep next to her. You’ll still know immediately if she needs anything. If you don’t take care, you’ll be of no use to her.”

Shit.

Leonard isn’t an idiot. He knows Rip is right, it’s just… “She could’ve died, Rip. She barely kept it together for the fight. If she were anyone else, she wouldn’t have made it back to the ship in one piece. And now she’s—” He turns to look at her, unnaturally still and helpless.

“You can’t lose her.” Rip’s voice is low, and Leonard turns back to him, seeing the familiar pain in the other man’s eyes. “I understand.” His lips twitch, as if he means to smile, and he glances at Sara one more time. “I’ll make sure the two of you are left alone until I hear otherwise.”

Leonard has to swallow before he can speak. “Thank you, Rip.”

Alone with Sara again, Leonard watches her for a few seconds before stripping down to boxers and an undershirt and joining her under the covers, moving slowly so he doesn’t wake her, and checking to make sure the cloth on her forehead is still cool. As soon as he stops moving, she takes his hand again, squeezing harder this time, almost hard enough that it hurts, and he’s exhausted and takes comfort in her strength, falling asleep almost immediately.

***

She doesn't really intend to pretend she’s asleep while Rip and Leonard talk. It’s just that she’s still so tired, it’s easier to keep her eyes closed. When he joins her in bed, there’s nothing on Earth that could keep her from holding his hand, from doing what little she can to make their pain go away.

***

The first thing he’s aware of when he wakes is that Sara feels like she’s back to her normal temperature.

The second thing he’s aware of is that she’s wrapped herself around him in a way that is much too distracting when he knows she’s too sick to do anything. When he opens his eyes, he sees she’s still asleep, her breath deep and even, her eyes closed. His errant libido is replaced by a swell of love and contentment.

For the first time since this started, he actually  _ believes _ that she’s going to be okay, and she’s sleeping peacefully in his arms. He could stay in this moment forever.

***

“Come on, Len,” she whines. She hates that she’s whining, but it’s been two  _ days _ , and she’s sick of being stuck here. “Either let me out of bed or come join me.”

“No,” he drawls, smirking when she glares at him.

“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”

“Perhaps.”

She huffs, but she remembers how worried he’s been and how much better he seems today, and she can’t bring herself to give him too hard a time, not yet. It’s not like she’d be in much better shape if their situations had been reversed. “Fine,” she says. “We can play cards again. But no cheating this time!”

He looks entirely unrepentant. “I had to see whether your observational skills had returned to normal.”

She resists her impulse to stick her tongue out at him, instead trying for a sultry look. “There are plenty of other skills we can test, you know.”

“No.”

“Damnit, Len!”

***

He’d been right; it gets harder once she’s feeling better. She improves faster than Gideon had expected, though, and after just a couple more days, she’s allowed to resume (careful) physical activity.

“You may wish to avoid fights that are particularly strenuous for another few days,” she advises.

Sara meets his eyes in a way that tells him she’s taking that advice very loosely. “Let’s get off this ship.”

It’s easy enough to find a seedy bar not far from the ship. It’s even easier to find a bar fight, one that (true to doctor’s orders) isn’t particularly strenuous, not for them. She’s laughing as they leave the bar (everybody inside still alive and mostly uninjured), and she’s so full of life that Leonard has to pull her toward him and kiss her just as thoroughly as she’d just kicked ass.

They’re both panting when they pull apart, and it sounds like maybe some of the bar’s patrons are ready to come find them, so the run back to the Waverider is nearly silent. Nobody stops them as they make their way to their room, and once the door is closed, he can’t take his eyes off Sara.

She’s chuckling again, chest heaving, skin glistening. Her cheeks are a healthy pink, and her eyes are fixed on his. 

“Sex is probably particularly strenuous, huh?” she asks, and he thinks she’s trying to look disappointed. She squeaks when he crosses the room in two strides before lifting her up and setting her on the bed.

“You just lie back,” he says, hiding a grin when her eyes darken. “I’ll do all the work.”

She bites her lip. “Maybe just this once.”

She succeeds in letting him do  _ most _ of the work, so in the end, he counts it as a win.

They drift off still wrapped up in each other, and Leonard’s last waking thought is that he’s never felt more at home.


End file.
